Vehicle

Review

I have owned the 2013 Kia Optima Hybrid only a week and I LOVE IT!
I have owned Porsche, Mercedes, Cadillac, Infiniti, Lincoln, Honda, Volkswagen, Ford, Chevrolet, Nissan, Dodge, Plymouth, and more and I would rate this vehicle as one of my all time favorites.
I love the fact that I can drive the vehicle hundred plus miles and the gas gauge ticks off one notch equal to about 2 gallons of gas.
The car is quiet, smooth, and well built.
I also love the 5 years and 60,000 mile warranty.
No worries for about 4-5 years.
I figured out I am saving over $300 a month on gas from my Porsche Cayenne S I just replaced.
I love that.

Worst Features

I live in the northern Seattle suburbs and have had a Kia Optima Hybrid for one year now.
I am more than pleased with the gasoline mileage I get with this vehicle in this climate.
In warmer months (when nighttime lows are greater than 45 degrees F, I get better than 41 MPG combined, and during the winter months I've always gotten better than 39 MPG.
I attribute the lower gasoline mileage during winter months to two factors: 1) the gasoline formulation coming from the refineries, 2) the gasoline engine runs more just to wrm it up to meet/keep EPA required emission standards.
Having said that, I do use all the "instantaneous mileage devices to moderate that urge to "stomp on the gas," but I'm used to that having driven farm trucks and using the vaccuum gauge to do the same thing.
The real surprise to me, was the gas I realized I didn't burn when driving in stop and go conditions like through a city.
I'd go for a mile or more from stoplight to stoplight (and 10 minutes) on the electric motor alone.
Thus, my instanteous "city" mileage was almost as good as my highway mileage, in fact, better than my highway mileage when driving against the prevailing wind.
For all the "hypermiling" I may try to do, there are times when I have to tromp down on the accelerator, and this car has the torque, thanks to the electric motor, to get up and go.
"hypermiling" is not a bad thing.
In fact, the first (and best) Defensive Driving course I took back in the 70's taught defensive driving techniques that overlap hypermiling techniques.